DECADES of RACING

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NASCAR BUSCH SERIES 

     Even though NASCAR and long-time patron Anhaeuser-Busch have changed the name several times, the Busch Series traces its roots to 1950. That's when NASCAR founder Bill France Sr. named his second-level series the Sportsman Division. It was created as a lower-profile, more relaxed, and relatively inexpensive alternative to the fledgling Strictly Stock Division that eventually became Winston Cup.    " Sportsman " was renamed " Grand National" in 1982. Budweiser was its primary sponsor for several years before the good folks at Anheuser-Busch headquarters in St. Louis decided to make Busch brand the series' sponsor instead of Budweiser.

     For years, young drivers dreaming of making it into NASCAR's upper level had few options. They could walk right in and try starting at the top--a costly, risky, and perhaps unwise route ( and which NASCAR no longer allows)  or they could start in a lower level at weekly short track races in hopes of getting to Late Model Sportsman, then Winston Cup. When NASCAR created its Busch Series in 1982, it eased the transition from those 1/3-mile Friday night bullrings to the Saturday afternoon super speedway races.  

     Late Model Sportsman cars of the '60s and '70s weren't nearly as fast, sophisticated or costly as Cup cars. They ran mostly 100 or 200 lap races at backwater short tracks that didn't have Winston Cup dates. The atmosphere generally was low-key, the purse was modest, and the media attention was almost nonexistent. But that circuit of weekend races wasn't the ideal training ground. The competition was there but not like with the Cup guys.

     Tracks were so widely scattered that the best drivers in New England might never face the best in the Carolinas. Competition was diluted even more since every track operated on Friday or Saturday night, leaving promoters little choice but to offer under-the-table deal money to attract stars to their tracks. What's more, a local backmarker might discover where the regional stars were going, then make plans to be somewhere else.   More often than not the national Late Model Sportsman champion was the driver who started the most races and finished the best. The level of competition seldom had anything to do with it. 

     That did change with the advent of the Busch Series. Instead of between 55 and 65 races for the national short-track championship, NASCAR created a touring series of 28 to 32 points-paying races and called it Grand National.  Except for the cost and the tracks it visited, it was similiar to Winston Cup. ( To stay alive when NASCAR scrapped the unwieldy Late Model division in 1981, local short tracks replaced it with their own Late Model Stock Car class. )

      In the Grand National series, the same drivers ran each race, a refreshing change that brought an end to the deal-money era that had created hard feelings among mid- and  lower-level drivers. And instead of racing under varying track rules and conditions so prevelant  under the old system, Grand National rules were uniform throughout the nation. The same group of inspectors and officials worked every event and NASCAR even created a seperate marketing and public relations division for the series.

Busch Racing

Should the Winston Cup guys be allowed to run in the Busch Series? YES NO UNDECIDED

Current Results

     Just as Winston Cup began growing in the '80s and '90s, the Busch sponsored Grand National Series began coming of age too.  It started by running more Saturday afternoon races in support of Sunday Cup racing, a tactic that brought more cup drivers into Busch racing (see poll above) With more Cup drivers came large crowds, which led to larger purses, which led to more teams, which led to more sponsors, which created more media attention.   

     In 1996 the Busch Series ran 17 same-weekend shows in support of a Winston Cup event the next day. They went to three other tracks ( Loudon, New Hampshire; Watkins Glen, New York; and Fontana, California ) where Cup cars already race, but on non-Winston Cup weekends as "stand-alone" events.  In a big turnaround from past years, the series visited only four tracks (Nashville; South Boston, Virginia; Hickory, North Carolina; and Myrtle Beach, South Carolina ) that could be considered traditional, old time, weekly short tracks.  Even those old short tracks are starting to disappear from the Busch schedule as money and interest increases.  

     Whether that's good or bad depends on your outlook. Old-timers who still embrace the close quarters racing typical on 1/4- mile, 1/3 -mile, and 5/8 -mile tracks bemoan the loss of traditional venues like Hickory, South Boston, and Lanier, Georgia. If they want to watch a super speedway race, they say, they'll simply go to a Cup race on Sunday afternoon.  The Busch Series, they argue, was never designed as a condensed version of Winston Cup.  

     So how is the Busch Series doing? It drew more than 115,000 fans for the 1998 season opener race at Daytona, and a similar number for the early-season race at Talladega, Alabama, and a May race at Charlotte. All told the series expected to attract almost 3.5 million fans in 1999.

     To the casual fan, a Busch car racing around Daytona International Speedway looks a lot like a Winston Cup car. Its wheelbase is five inches shorter (105 vs. 110 of a Cup car) and it's tuned with a 9.5-to-1 compression ratio engine (Cup cars run 14-to-1). Busch cars weigh 100 pounds less (3,300 vs. 3,400 lbs.) and their engines only generate about 520 horsepower, roughly 200 to 230 less than a Cup car. Speeds are comparable at most tracks since the Busch car's weight and wheelbase almost make up for it's weaker engine.  

      The future of the Busch Series depends largely on what NASCAR sees as it's role.  Is it to provide an intermediate stepping stone for young drivers headed from weekly short tracks to Winston Cup, or is it's role to give super speedway promoters an attractive Saturday afternoon support race?  Whatever happens, this much is evident: Bill France Sr. would be stunned to see what his old "Sportsman Division" has become. Come to think of it, even those who've been around since the Busch Series was created in 1982 are pretty stunned by how far it's come in 16 years.